Mt. Everest Expedition: Team Climbs Kalapathar, Sherpas to Camp 2 and Back

The day started pretty early for Lam Babu and the Sherpa squad. They were putting on crampons at 4 AM and getting busy with the Khumbu Icefall as daylight came on. The five men were passing Camp One by around 6:30 and carrying their loads on up toward Camp 2 (Advanced Basecamp or ABC). The rest of us were just getting up and enjoying a calm morning at EBC, happy that the storm of the past couple of days seems to have fled. Great day for another hike, as it turned out. We went for a slightly farther goal today, if not exactly higher. Kalapathar is around 18,300 ft and we’d beaten that the other day on Pumori Camp One, but for KP we needed to descend farther, pretty much to the village of Gorak Shep. So the overall altitude gain, including having to climb all the way back up to Basecamp afterward, was greater. Exactly what the doctor ordered… more exercise at altitude, more great views. Kalapathar is actually not a mountain summit in its own right. It is more properly about as high as you can reasonably go in trail shoes on the start of one of Pumori’s insanely steep ridges. But it is perfectly positioned to gain views of Everest, Lhotse and Nuptse, not to mention Pumori. And it is popular. We were in the mainstream of trekker and climber and porter traffic again, and things are definitely getting busy now. Just walking through Basecamp takes us a good twenty minutes and we are only going through about two thirds of camp (since we live in the upper third). But it turned out to be a wonderful day and we even had the top of Kalapathar to ourselves -for a few minutes, at least.
We were able to keep in communication with the Sherpa team and were pleased to hear that they were all back down to base by about noon. A monumental effort, all safely accomplished. So now, although we don’t have tents up yet at either place (no sense putting them up any earlier than necessary, the wind would just take them down) we have Camps One and Two established.
The team is working steadily up toward the goal of safely taking on the Icefall. The route to Camp One is steep, technically difficult, dangerous and at high altitude… So if it seems like we are going out of our way to be ready for that first time through… We are.
Best Regards,
RMI Guide Dave Hahn